Lawmaker backs backs off comments on bike riders, climate change

Washington Republican apologizes for email to shop owner

A Washington state lawmaker has apologized for saying that bicyclists contribute to climate change with their heavy breathing.

Republican Rep. Ed Orcutt, of Kalama, is the ranking minority member of the state's House Transportation Committee.

He apologized Monday for writing in an email last week that "the act of riding a bike results in greater emissions of carbon dioxide from the rider.

He was responding to bike store owner who was upset about a proposed fee on some new bicycle purchases.

"You claim that it is environmentally friendly to ride a bike," Orcutt said in the email. "But if I am not mistaken, a cyclists has an increased heart rate and respiration. That means that the act of riding a bike results in greater emissions of carbon dioxide from the rider. Since CO2 is deemed to be a greenhouse gas and a pollutant, bicyclists are actually polluting when they ride."

Orcutt is a fiscal conservative and believes cyclists should help pay for the upkeep of roads.

Orcutt says he was trying to say that bicyclists don't have a zero carbon footprint but that it was poorly worded.

"My point was that by not driving a car, a cyclist was not necessarily having a zero-carbon footprint," Orcutt said in the email, according to Reuters. "In looking back, it was not a point worthy of even mentioning so, again, I apologize."

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